The truth is that, whether we know it or not, we are all constantly being hypnotized everyday of our lives.

Sometimes this is deliberate, and sometimes it’s also good.

When a friend cheers you up after you’ve had a bad day, they probably don’t know it, but that’s a form of hypnosis.

When you decide to by that new pair of shoes after being dazzled by the latest ad, yes I’m afraid you were hypnotized.

Of course, by ‘hypnotized’ I don’t mean in the creepy mind control sense you see in the movies, what I mean is that you responded subconsciously to an idea placed by somebody else.

Often that happens to subtly that even if you’re looking for it, it’s hard to spot.

Perhaps you said hi to an old friend the other day, and they ignored you.

In reality they probably just didn’t happen to hear your greeting, but maybe you subconsciously interpreted this as a form of rejection, and left feeling bad.

Why is this hypnosis? Because your state of mind changed based on the implied idea or message behind someone’s non verbal communication (or lack thereof).

This subtle, unintentional hypnosis happens all the time.

Some people live their lives constantly being buffeted around by ill-informed guesses as to what others think of them.

If someone pays them a compliment, they cheer up because they accept the positive hypnotic suggestion.

If someone is rude to them, they get depressed because they accept the negative hypnotic suggestion.

This can be a big problem, because before you know it instead of living YOUR life on YOUR terms, you’re merely a hacky sac being kicked around clumsily by the ideas and messages you surround yourself with.

Of course, as human beings and members of a social species, we cannot help responding in someway to the messages and reactions around us, which is what it’s important to surround yourself with positive people in a positive, interesting environment.

But there’s only a certain amount you can do to control the world around you.

What you do have more or less complete control of, however, is the world within you.

This is an attitude shift as much as anything.

Imagine how much better life would be if, instead of being at the mercy of the outside world, you were in complete control of your word.

Not only does this make things better immediately but it also has a ripple effect.

The way you think affects the way you behave, and the way you behave effects the world around you.

I think the “law of attraction” hyped things up a little too much when it claimed that your thoughts effect the real world directly, but that’s just my opinion. What I do know is that the way you think effects YOUR world, and the way you BEHAVE effects the world at large.

The paradigm shift I want you to make is to realize that the way you react to what happens in the world is often much more important than what actually happens.

Stop being ‘hypnotized’ without your knowledge by the world around you, and become your own hypnotist!

We all understand the rules or process of “eating out”. If you want to get a meal, you must place your order. It’s just that simple and all of us would say it is common sense. You can sit in a restaurant all day long but if you don’t place an order you will see everyone else get fed except for you. No order – no meal!

Do you understand the rules or process of “using your mind”? You may have heard the phrase that Thoughts become Things. Without a thought a thing could not exist. It is the basic rule of Cause and Effect. Without a cause there cannot be an effect, that’s basic science. Cause being the thought and effect being the materialization of thought.

Everything began with a thought. Someone had to think about how to make a computer before it could be made. The clothes you are wearing began as a thought in someone’s mind. The food you eat, the car you drive and even the words that you say began with thought. This even extends into how your life has turned out. Your wealth or lack of, health or disorder, happiness or despair. It all began with a thought whether it came from you or someone else or society in general. That is Cause and Effect.

Most people have difficulty believing in the Cause, as it is invisible and they only understand the Effect because they can see it. This explains why so many live such limited lives. It is like electricity. It is invisible yet it is responsible for your lights turning on and your toaster being able to toast. The seen comes from the unseen. We cannot see air yet we can breathe. We cannot see gravity but we stay on the ground. If you do not believe in this unseen or invisible gravity, just try jumping in the air and see if you come down or not. Without the Cause or the invisible portion of the equation there would be no lights, air or gravity for us to have the desired effect.

Going back to the restaurant again, you realize that you must place an order to be able to get your meal. Your mind works the same way. You must place an order mentally, with your thoughts before you can receive anything you want as well. That sounds obvious but it is done so little.

When you are sick, you must imagine yourself as healthy in order to be healthy.

You must imagine happiness in order to be happy. You must think of wealth in order to be wealthy. You are presently the result of your dominant thoughts.

It’s amazing how many times when asking someone what they want how they respond with what they “don’t” want. Since you always attract your dominant thoughts or what you focus on; if you are focusing on the negative then that is what you will get. In other words if you focus on not getting a divorce, your focus is on getting a divorce and that is being attracted to you. That is the order you placed. Instead you must focus on being happy or having a loving relationship.

Whenever things are going bad, downhill or negatively, stop your present way of thinking and immediately ask yourself: What do I want?” and only focus on that. Someone approached me the other day stating that they were so upset and everything seem to be going so badly. They wished there were a way that this streak of negative could just stop and things could be better. I asked the young man if he had taken the time to think of how he would like to be feeling? He looked at me in such a puzzled manner as if I was speaking in an unknown language. Of course he hadn’t, he was too busy focusing on being miserable and thereby attracting more misery.

If you don’t focus on happiness then you will not have it. Why? In order for there to be a change there must be a change. Something must interrupt the negative flow and change it’s direction. A new thought must exist to do that.

You must think of, focus on or order health in order to be healthy. You must order success in order to be successful. You must order a loving relationship in order to have one. You must desire and order happiness in order to have it.

The average human has about 64,000 thoughts a day. So you are going to have thoughts whether you want to or not. Each one of them is placing an order of some sort. Most of them cancel each other out. We are ordering machines, constantly placing orders that we are not even aware of. If you are going to do it by default anyway then why not take advantage of this process and deliberately begin placing orders for your benefit.

The allure of being “The Hypnotist” is often so powerful that people forget there are many other ways to create change and transformation, in yourself and in others. I thought I’d share with your four ways to create powerful changes… without using “hypnosis.”

Hopefully this post will give you some ideas and show you just how many tools, models and methodologies you have available.

Tool 1: NLP

Some people say that NLP was created as a way to “take hypnosis out of hypnosis,” and market disguised hypnosis techniques to main stream therapists, and the corporate world.

The overlap between NLP and hypnosis (whatever “hypnosis” is…) is massive, but there are a lot of new things to pick up. My biggest piece of advice if you are going to look into NLP is not to get sucked into what I consider the rather cult like world of trainers, certifications and “camps.”

Learn from who you like, and use what you find valuable, and don’t worry about which NLP big name’s logo you want to be able to put on your wall!

Tool 2: Old School Persuasion and Influence

The field of persuasion, influence is huge! From sales training to presentation skills, nearly everything taught can be cross applied to do whatever you want it to do! Sales techniques can definitely help you be a better street hypnotist, and public speaking tricks can most certainly help you be more persuasive in everyday conversations.

When you’re next in a book store, flick through a few books on sales techniques and public speaking, and you’ll probably find a lot of gems.

Tool 3: Conventional (or Unconventional) Wisdom

The biggest mistake people make in the world of self development, is reading about nothing but self development!

To paraphrase Milton Erickson, self development books often have how to be successful in life wrapped up in a nutshell, trouble is “they miss out the nut, and only take the shell!”

Read a biography of someone you admire. Delve into classic works of fiction. Read about history and philosophy. Broaden your horizons and become curious about the entire world! You’ll pick up ideas, tips, stories and principles that will help you tremendously in whatever interaction you find yourself in.

Tool 4: The Big Wide World…

Sorry, I told a lie in the last tool.

The biggest mistake people make in the self development world is NOT only reading about self development… it’s only reading!

My greatest love is travel. I love hopping on a plane at night, and waking up in a strange foreign city. You meet new people, and discover weird and wonderful ways of looking at the world.

Make the world your playground, get out there, and start taking action.

The trouble with the world of influence / self development, is that it’s core question is often a harmful one.

People ask “how can I act differently so that I get more from life.”

The very premise of that question concedes that how you are is wrong, but rather than improve yourself on a deep level, you should simply modify a few external behaviors, and pretend that you’re something that you’re not.

So, people learn techniques, and tools and patterns and principles, and set about trying to consciously change their behavior, without changing themselves.

While the patterns and techniques certainly are powerful and are used by many for great effect, at the end of the day they are empty… unless you are congruent!

What Is Congruence

Congruence is when your beliefs and your actions are aligned.

It is when you are what you do.

If you look to anyone who is truly charismatic and persuasive, you’ll notice that while they probably are using techniques of influence, consciously or otherwise, what really makes the difference is that they are congruent with what they are doing.

Why Is Congruence So Powerful?

There are dozens of answers to this question.

Congruence is powerful because incongruence is extremely noticeable – if you are using techniques to veil or hide your personality, I’m afraid it tends to stick out. People can tell that you aren’t really being you, and while you make get some results, it will only be a faint shadow of what you’d achieve whilst being congruent.

How To You Become Congruent?

Well, actually congruence is easy!

It’s what we naturally are. The answer is simply stop being incongruent!

Of course, there’s a lot more to it than that. But the first step is always awareness. Become aware of the importance of congruence, and start consciously stopping yourself from acting incongruently in your interactions.

It can be confusing at first – many of us have been stopping ourselves from being congruent all our lives, and it’s a real effort to remember which behaviors are authentic to us, and which ones are the masks that we’re simply accustomed to wearing.

How to Use Tools of Influence Whilst Being Congruent

There is nothing more powerful than someone who is both congruent and a skilled and well trained influencer. These people truly live free and fulfilled lives, and help others do likewise.

When I teach persuasion and influence skills, my goal is to always help you balance technique with congruence. This means that as well as learning the cool tricks of influence that are so popular – pattern interrupts, language techniques and so on – you’ll learn to integrate them into your natural, congruent way of interacting.

This means you can walk through the world whilst naturally being a powerful influencer – without having to fake it.

The key to this is to realize that who we are changes. So, rather than asking yourself “how can I pretend to be a better influencer than I am” simply ask yourself “how can I become a better influencer than I am…”

It may seem blindingly simple, but this one fundamental shift will free you from the baggage which seems to trap 99% of society!

In this article on influence and conversational hypnosis, you’re going to learn about the stunning power of silence. In many situations silence is probably the most powerful persuasion tool. I discovered this decades ago through all my business dealings, whilst traveling and throughout life.

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This is especially true in business negotiations, when coming to an impasse I would simply remain quiet. Although each situation is unique, one overriding truth is that both parties are there for a successful conclusion and generally do not wish to upset the proceedings and walk away with nothing.

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Silence puts you in a position of strength, a position of power. By staying silent and maintaining confident yet not menacing eye contact, it shows that you’re in control of your reactions, you’re in control of your emotions and you’re in control of the situation.

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Mark Twain said, “It is better to let others think you a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.” And yes, in many situations speaking too much can be far more harmful than speaking too little.

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Often, and this is a goal of mine, I try and put myself in as many social situations with people who are far more experienced than I am in a particular field I want to learn about, far smarter than I am in a particular field that I’m entering. Fields like marketing or anything else new that I’m going into in order improve my business and the way that I communicate and teach for you guys. In those situations, rather than trying to talk your mouth off as much as possible and prove that you know as much as them and have the right to sit at that table, it’s often very powerful just to maintain a dignified silence, ask appropriate questions, make the comments that occur to you but make your goal less speech, rather than more speech.

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Try this in the next conversation that you have. Say as little as possible and get them to do nearly all the talking.

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You see, the nuances of silence can be quite tricky. Because if you’re silent in a conversational setting where you’re trying to influence somebody to change a belief, take a certain course of action, make a certain deal or whatever it is that you’re aiming for, often silence is the worst thing to do. You do need to say things, you do need to stimulate emotions, and get your point across, obviously. However, in some situations, hold thy tongue. It is a powerful attitude. And the reason I’m spending this lesson filled with noise about getting you to be silent is because the attitude that silence is a negotiation tool, rather than lack of something, is a powerful one.

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If you ever have to make a public speech, try this, and it’s something that I do all the time, because I do a lot of public speaking, enough that I have to share the stage with other people. And most good speakers, not great but good speakers, will bound onstage energetically and immediately begin talking. That’s good. It’s energetic; it gets the audience’s attention, nothing wrong with that.

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Most bad speakers will shuffle onstage and also begin talking immediately but less energetically and in a more withdrawn way.

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A very powerful way to immediately capture the audience’s attention which, if you will think back to our pattern interrupt lesson, also works as a powerful pattern interrupt, is to walk on stage calmly and slowly. Look around at the audience and just maintain your silence.

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The key is, silence is uncomfortable in western culture.

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You’ll notice that in conversations at dinner parties and group conversations. Whenever there’s a silence that goes on for more than about three or four seconds, somebody will always try and break it.

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Become aware of this. Think about the last group conversation you were in or even a one on one conversation. Notice that somebody will always jump in and fill the silence. It’s actually a well-documented phenomenon, particularly among English speaking people. We cannot deal with silence. It’s awkward, it’s uncomfortable and for us, it implies that we don’t have anything to say to eachother.

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However, if you think back to spending time with someone you love, perhaps your husband or your wife, your family, you’ll think or notice or realize that silence is actually part of your relationship. You can be silent in eachother’s presence without it being hostile or uncomfortable. And have you ever wondered that perhaps one of the reasons why going to see a show or a movie with a date or with a partner is so powerful is because it creates a safe context in which you can be silent in eachother’s presence? Isn’t that interesting? It creates a safe context in which you can be silent in eachother’s presence. Silence is particularly powerful.

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Now, going back to the example of walking on stage and holding your silence, just hold it until it becomes uncomfortable. You’re sending a lot of powerful messages. You’re saying you’re in control of yourself and your responses and, this is the big one, that you can handle the silence. That you’re so completely comfortable and justified and assured in your own presence that you do not need to speak to justify yourself being there.

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Maintain the silence only until it becomes uncomfortable and then wait just one more second before talking. Staying silent forever obviously isn’t going to do you any good but using silence as an effective influence tool can be exceedingly powerful.

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Another thing about silence is that when you’re not speaking, your body language becomes so much more important. Now, books and books and books have been written on body language. Telling you this gesture means that, that gesture means this, crossing the arms means defensive, scratching the nose means lying, open posture means confident, this, that or the other. I’d like to break it down for you just a little bit more in terms of how body language compliments silence. Think about this from the perspective of human evolution. In terms of very, very basic fundamental mammalian human interactions, body language is about how we present our body, obviously, to the people around us. But think about it because body language, the term, has become such a nominalization; think about it in terms of how we present our body to the people around us.

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Now, this is why things like crossing your arms, putting your hand on your face, scratching your nose, are often thought of as signs of deceptiveness or defensiveness because they’re covering up the crucial areas of the body, the soft areas, the stomach, the neck, the mouth, the nose. Whereas if you’re confident, you can open up those areas. You can stand tall exposing the vulnerable areas of the neck and the stomach. You have confidence in what you’re saying if you’re speaking. So you don’t have to put your hand over your mouth and cover up your words as if you’re retracting them or to scratch your nose as if you were trying to keep the words inside your mouth.

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Rather than teaching you this gesture means this, that gesture means that, I think it’s far more powerful for you to come to an understanding of the language of the body and what you’re physically saying to people as if you’re carrying out a mime, you’re trying to keep the words inside, you’re trying to protect this part of your body. You’re trying to move something forward or backwards, make it bigger, or smaller, your body language is constantly speaking.

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And when you’re not speaking, when you’re silent, the way you hold yourself becomes more and more important. If you’re silent with an offensive posture, with your arms folded and such like, maybe your hand over your mouth, it can make you seem quite withdrawn, quite defensive. However, if you’re silent with a curious posture, open but cognitive, hand perhaps on the face to indicate thinking, but open with your stomach and neck while exposed, perhaps raised eyebrows to indicate curiosity, and firm yet calm and reassuring eye contact with the people you’re speaking to, silent yet curious, it’s encouraging them to keep speaking. It puts the ball in their court and the pressure on them.

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This is why silence is so powerful as a negotiating position and this is obviously what I discovered on my travels. Most people expect when you make a demand of them for you to do all the talking. But if you simply make your demand and then confidently and kindly, not menacingly but kindly, yet confidently, put the pressure on them and expect them to continue speaking, holding calm and reassuring eye contact with a slight warm, yet not smug, smile, it puts the ball in their court and the pressure on them. And chances are most people will not be equipped to deal with that pressure and after trying to break your frame, after trying to get you to start speaking, to start justifying yourself and to take the pressure on yourself, they’ll eventually do what you want them to do.

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Now obviously, this is a situation only used for sort of special circumstances. Only when you sort of have the upper hand or you’re making a demand in a short term setting, like in a business negotiation or a sale or a transaction or such like. I wouldn’t run around using it every day of your life because that’s just a little manipulative and it will get a little annoying as well.

. All these tools should be used a limited amount, with limited power. It’s like if you learn a really powerful quote. Use it once in one conversation or in one speech and it will blow people away, act as an instant re-frame, change the way people think about what you’re going on about and really orientate the discussion towards where you want to take it. Use it every day, eight times a day, and it will just get annoying like a broken record.

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Use all of these tools well and use them reservedly. Recognize their power and obviously only use them responsibly and positively.

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So get out there and start playing with silence, openly. Just hold silence. Not until it becomes annoying, but just before then, show people that you control the frame. That you’re comfortable with putting the pressure on them, that you can handle the silence, that you’re in control of your reactions and you don’t feel the pressure to constantly justify yourself by speaking. There’s strong silence and there’s shy silence and there’s silent silence. You want to focus on strong silence to build suspense, to build mystery, to build curiosity and to put the pressure on the other people. It’s powerful stuff. Get out there and use this well.

From nothing, Steve Jobs founded, built and championed a company which today is worth over 100 billion dollars.

His vision, passion and drive revolutionized the way we interact with each other, experience entertainment, and view the purpose and potential of technology.

How did he do it?

Friends and colleagues of Steve commented that one of his most compelling traits was what they called his “Reality Distortion Field.”

With the combination of a charismatic speaking manner, an unwavering gaze, and complete self certainty, Steve was able to convince people to believe, and later do, the impossible.

Throughout his career Steve Jobs often encountered doubt and resistance.

Many of the ideas which we now know were brilliant – from the iPhone to Apple Stores, were first met with ridicule and scorn from many extremely intelligent people.

Steve’s reality distortion field blew those doubts out of the water, and caused people to take action, and create changes and transformations that, to use Job’s own phrase, would “Put a dent in the universe.”

The power of the reality distortion field stems from one simple secret:

In order to convince others, you must first convince yourself.

People in the world of hypnosis and NLP call this “Go There First.”

What makes the reality distortion field such a rare gift is that most people don’t know how to convince themselves.

Most people source their beliefs from the world around them.

They constantly “ping” or reality check the people and inputs around them, constantly seeking to confirm that what they believe is true.

We search the reactions and behaviors of others to make sure we’re not out of line, and rapidly abandon out independence and sense of self when lost in a crowd.

Going against the raging tide of social pressure is a hugely demanding task.

Achieve it, however, and you’ll no doubt be able to pull others along with you.

Of course, what the masses believe is not always wrong.

In fact, most of the time it’s actually right on the money.

Ignoring everything everyone else believes and living in a world entirely of your own design is a pretty good definition of insanity.

Ignoring other peoples limitations and creating a world entirely of your own design is a pretty good definition of genius.

Like everything, it’s a sliding scale.

A sensible solution would be to be aware of the inputs of the world at large, and pay good attention to what others think, feel and believe.

After all, you are a part of humanity, and while there may be areas where you want to break free and carve your own ground, conformity is not always a bad thing.

However, when asked, Mark Twain said, whenever you find yourself on the side of the masses, “it’s time to pause and reflect.”

Don’t go on a bender of anarchic reality denial, in which you refuse to believe what others do.

Likewise, don’t be yet another sheep in the herd, believing only what society gives you permission to think.

Make a conscious decision to live a life of your own design, and set out to create a set of beliefs which are useful and empowering.

The human power of observation is quite limited. People generally see what they expect to see. Here’s an interesting experiment that Daniel Levin created to show how poor our skills of real observation can be.

“Confidence” is becoming a bit of a buzzword. Want to learn how to do hypnosis? People will tell you that you must be confident, otherwise it won’t work.

Want to communicate with impact and power? Again – no “confidence, no chance.”

The problem is the “confidence myth” sets a lot of people off in the wrong direction.

It starts with people missing one big distinction:

Confidence is Not Certainty

A lot of people think confidence is the same as certainty.

That is, in order to be “confident” you need to be certain that whatever you’re attempting – from a hypnosis induction to an influence strategy – will be successful.

If you have any doubts, fears, nervousness or anxiety, then you lack certainty. If you lack certainty, so the myth goes, you lack confidence.

Chasing certainty is chasing a red herring. The truth is that in the real world (which most of us like to drop in on, on occasion) there is never true certainty about success.

Sure, you can be pretty certain the sun will rise tomorrow, but you can’t be certain that you’ll achieve a particularly goal to the letter, pull off a particular technique perfectly, or even that success – when you do achieve it – will look and feel like you expected it to.

Keep waiting for certainty, and…

certainty becomes cement!

No matter how brilliant you become as a hypnotist or influencer, there will never be 100% certainty that you be successful.

However, people who feel that they need to be confident before they succeed, and that confidence = certainty will wait forever, hoping that eventually success will be a given.

Wait for certainty, and you’ll be stuck in cement forever.

So, how do you move forward constructively, without certainty?

You now know that confidence is not certainty. There’s another distinction you need to become alert to:

Outcome Dependence Vs. Outcome Acceptance

If you’re waiting for certainty, you’re what people call “outcome dependent.”

You’re performance and sense of self – your “self esteem” if you insist on another buzzword – is connected inseparably from your outcome. If you succeed to the letter, you’re fine. If you fail in anyway, you’ve lost.

This tunnel vision win / lose way of thinking is all too familiar for most of us. At school, you pass or you fail. A correct answer is good, a wrong answer is bad.

At work, a mistake can mean you lose your job, doing what you’re told can lead to a bonus.

Often we learn to focus exclusively on outcome

And yes, of COURSE outcomes matter. I’d never pretend that they don’t…

BUT

Outcomes Aren’t Permanent!

One failure doesn’t spell doom. One upset doesn’t mean the world has ended.

When people get outcome dependent they blow the possibility of failure way out of proportion.

Psychologists know that people are dreadful at predicting our own emotional reactions to future events.

This plus our disposition to see outcomes as binary “failure = bad, success = good” events, means we make the idea of failure 10,000 times more powerful than it really is.

Try this exercise…

Think about something that you think you would like more “confidence” for. A hypnosis or influence techniques, or anything at all.

Ask yourself what the old fashioned way of thinking would define as a successful outcome, or a failed outcome.

Imagine that whatever you’re attempted failed. Run it through it your mind. Actually make it as realistic as possible.

Move forward a month in the future, and imagine looking back on the event from then. Was it really so bad? Probably not. Move forward another year, and then ten years, and you’ll probably laugh over how much time and energy you spent worrying about such a small failure!

Here’s Where Certainty Returns…

So, failure ain’t that bad.

Instead of account dependence, you now have outcome acceptance. You accept any possible outcome, and make yourself ok with this.

You do this by giving yourself certainty in your ability to survive the outcome.

Listen: When it comes to learning a skill and try new things, no matter WHAT the outcome is, you can survive it! Sure you may go through some negative emotion, but it’s not just a cliche that this stuff makes you stronger.

Spend a moment thinking about all the reasons you used to have that convinced you that failure was devastating – break them down, and you’ll realize that, actually, you’re a lot stronger that that, and that no matter the outcome, you will be just fine!

Seneca and Certainty…

At my live seminars, I tell the story of the stoic philosopher Seneca’s answer to greed:

If you are greedy for wealth, the philosopher says, it is actually because you fear poverty.

How do you alleviate this fear? For one week a year, dress yourself in nothing but rags, eat only watery soup, and sleep not on your bed, but on the floor. Wander around in your shabbiest attire and abstain from any expense or luxury.

Do this for a week, and you’ll realize that actually, what you feared was not all that bad. You still had your health, your friends, your faculties.

Having faced your nightmare, you can be certain that you’ll be able to survive it. Therefore, you can relax!

The Story Isn’t Over Yet…

Make this perspective your reality, and you’ll free yourself from a massive amount of anxiety and fear.

Plus, you’ll be able to take sensible risks and face new situations whole heartedly, without fear, because you know that no matter what happens, you’ll be equipped to deal with it.

Know that failure is not permanent, and think of it as part of the learning curve – a part that you’re more than capable of coping with, and you’ll be just fine!